The simplest spiritual discipline is some degree of solitude and silence. But it's the hardest, because none of us want to be with someone we don't love. Besides that, we invariably feel bored with ourselves, and all our loneliness comes to the surface.

We won't have the courage to go into that terrifying place without Love to protect us and lead us, without the light and love of God overriding our own self-doubt. Such silence is the most spacious and empowering technique in the world, yet it's not a technique at all. It's precisely the refusal of all technique.

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the founder of the Cistercians, set the gold standard for mystical writing in his Commentary on the Song of Songs [1]. All he could resort to was the one erotic book in the Bible to communicate what happens between God and the soul.

He said that we are the mutual food of one another, just as lovers are. Jesus gives us himself as food in the Eucharist, and the willing soul offers itself for God to “eat” in return: “If I eat and am not eaten, it will seem that God is in me, but I am not yet in God” (Commentary 71:5 [2]). I must both eat God and be eaten by God, Bernard says. Now this is the language of mystical theology, and is upsetting to the merely rational mind, but utterly delightful and consoling to anyone who knows the experience.

He said that we are the mutual food of one another, just as lovers are. Jesus gives us himself as food in the Eucharist, and the willing soul offers itself for God to “eat” in return: “If I eat and am not eaten, it will seem that God is in me, but I am not yet in God” (Commentary 71:5 [2]). I must both eat God and be eaten by God, Bernard says. Now this is the language of mystical theology, and is upsetting to the merely rational mind, but utterly delightful and consoling to anyone who knows the experience.

NOW we're talking. I looove this kind of stuff. I could eat this kind of food any time for lunch. And breakfast and snacks. AMEN Richard!!

Alan

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

At times we have to step into God’s silence and wait. We have to put out the fleece as Gideon did (Judges 6:37-40 [1]), and wait for the descent of the divine dew, or some kind of confirmation from God. That is a good way to keep our own ego drive out of the way.

There are other times when we need to go ahead and act on our own best intuitions and presume that God is guiding us–but even then we must wait for the divine backup. Sometimes that is even the greater act of faith and courage.

When either waiting or moving forward is done out of a spirit of union and surrender, we can trust that God will make good out of it—even if we are mistaken! It is not about being correct; it is about being connected.

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

There are other times when we need to go ahead and act on our own best intuitions and presume that God is guiding us–but even then we must wait for the divine backup. Sometimes that is even the greater act of faith and courage.

When either waiting or moving forward is done out of a spirit of union and surrender, we can trust that God will make good out of it—even if we are mistaken! It is not about being correct; it is about being connected.

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Singing to my heart! For the third time this week, I'm without further comment on Rohr's meditation!

Alan

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

One good thing that silence and waiting has taught me is that our lives are always usable by God. We need not always be effective, but only transparent and vulnerable. Then we are instruments, no matter what we do. Silence is the ability to trust that God is acting, teaching, and using me—even before I perform, or after my seeming failures. Silence is the necessary space around things that allows them to develop and flourish without my pushing.

God takes it from there, and there is not much point in comparing who is better, right, higher or lower, or supposedly saved. We are all partial images slowly coming into focus, as long as we allow and filter the Light and Love of God, which longs to shine through us—as us!

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

The goal of all spirituality is to lead the “naked person” to stand trustfully before the naked God. The important thing is that we’re naked; in other words, that we come without title, merit, shame, or even demerit. All we can offer to God is who we really are, which to all of us never seems like enough. I am sure this is the way true lovers feel, too.

As you know, the act of lovemaking requires some degree of nakedness, and perhaps sacred silence to absorb the communion that is happening. The same is true in loving and being loved by God. We have to let go of our false self (as either superior or inferior) to allow God to choose us “in our lowliness” as Mary says (Luke 1:48 [1]). To do that, we have to be silent and wait. What a crucifixion this is sometimes!

Silence is the language of God, and the only language deep enough to absorb all the contradictions and failures that we are holding against ourselves. God loves us silently, because God has no case to make against us. Silent communion absorbs our self-hatred, as every lover knows.

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

Silence is the language of God, and the only language deep enough to absorb all the contradictions and failures that we are holding against ourselves. God loves us silently, because God has no case to make against us. Silent communion absorbs our self-hatred, as every lover knows.

Love it!

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

The same is true in loving and being loved by God. We have to let go of our false self (as either superior or inferior) to allow God to choose us “in our lowliness” as Mary says (Luke 1:48 [1]).

I think this may be the hardest thing of all, especially for those who have been raised to be ashamed. Because of the constant feelings of unworthiness even before people we hide in the bushes when God calls, just as Adam and Eve did, making ourselves believe that even God doesn't really want us around.

Logged

"Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children of God."This is the effect of true charity, to be on good terms with all men, to consider no one your enemy, and to live at peace with those who hate peace.--Robert Bellarmine

The same is true in loving and being loved by God. We have to let go of our false self (as either superior or inferior) to allow God to choose us “in our lowliness” as Mary says (Luke 1:48 [1]).

I think this may be the hardest thing of all, especially for those who have been raised to be ashamed. Because of the constant feelings of unworthiness even before people we hide in the bushes when God calls, just as Adam and Eve did, making ourselves believe that even God doesn't really want us around.

I think we mistake shame for humility. Totally different things. Mary was humble but not ashamed. We think we are going to teach humility by shaming people. We can better teach humility by first learning humility, and for that the desert is a good place to start. Anything the helps us a) realize we're not in control, and b) things will go OK if we let go for a bit. To me it's all synonymous with contemplation.

Alan

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

I think we mistake shame for humility. Totally different things. Mary was humble but not ashamed. We think we are going to teach humility by shaming people. We can better teach humility by first learning humility, and for that the desert is a good place to start. Anything the helps us a) realize we're not in control, and b) things will go OK if we let go for a bit. To me it's all synonymous with contemplation.

Alan

I agree that they are totally different things. I also believe that those raised with shame weren't raised that way by people trying to teach them humility. People who are humble who try to raise their children to have humility already have a sense of enlightenment that wouldn't allow them to induce shame on their children. Those raised in shame however are the products of parents who were bent on dominating their children much like you break the spirit of an animal, or who simply neglected their children giving them the clear message that their needs and desires weren't important.

Logged

"Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called children of God."This is the effect of true charity, to be on good terms with all men, to consider no one your enemy, and to live at peace with those who hate peace.--Robert Bellarmine

Prayer is largely just being silent: holding the tension instead of even talking it through, offering the moment instead of fixing it by words and ideas, loving reality as it is instead of understanding it fully. We must not push the river, we must just trust that we are really in the river, and God is the current.

That may be impractical, but the way of faith is not the way of efficiency. So much of life is just a matter of listening and waiting, and enjoying the expansiveness that comes from such willingness to hold. It is like carrying and growing a baby: women wait and trust and hopefully eat good food, and the baby is born.

~ Richard Rohr

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.

We don’t need to project or maintain any kind of self-image at all, when we discover ourselves “hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3 [1]). I hope this doesn’t sound too esoteric, because it isn’t. This is exactly what happens in true prayer and in true lovemaking too: “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine.” This lovely phrase is used three times in the “Song of Songs,” and is often found on contemporary Jewish mezuzahs, to be touched and invoked as you pass the doorway.

This is what will happen when we live first inside of silence, the silence that surrounds everything all the time. Only then can we stop exposing ourselves to the judgments of the world; only then will we stop “picking up” the energy of others; only then can we cease our endless self-commentary. We are who we are in God—no more and no less. We probably do need to remind ourselves of this almost every time we pass through a doorway.

Prayer:Listen to the stillness, the language of God.

Logged

... love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law.